Random Writings 2: Masculinity Kills

THis is apart of an OLD journal i wrote about a year ago. Some stuff could be expanded ( and maybe i will edit it later) but i just cut and pasted it and thought to share. expect mis-spellings. Yall know how i do shatwty.


Masculinity Kills

The real danger is not men. The real danger is not masculinity or masculine embodied people. The real danger is what we have defined masculinity to be. The danger is the beliefs, ideas and concepts that we have for too long defined as male and “masculine”. The danger is that we have defined these things to equate aggression, violence, control and being unemotive. The danger is that too many of us have accepted these codes unilaterally and unapologetically. It is this concept of masculinity, and our acceptance of it, which is a large part of the reason our communities, our families, and our planet is out of balance and spiraling out of control.

Pop Culture mythology has lead us to believe that maleness, or being born as what is perceived to be biologically male automatically equates a number of things. Some of these things are: A natural propsensity towards aggression and violence, an unemotive nature, and in many cases a wandering irresponsible sexuality. Yet science, like the culture itself, is biased. The Scientists who research sexuality and gender often go into their scientific studies looking for evidence to validate what society has already assumed to be true. Thus the hidden barrage of assumptions on what those who are "anatomically male" espouse are not taken as theory; but instead established as fact.

Yet many scientists have debunked the beliefs that anatomically “male” embodied people express specific characteristics. Feminist Scientists have also questioned the construction of “maleness’ and “femaleness” itself. Do our gene chromosomes match up so nicely to our sexual genitalia; and then by extension, our perceived gender? Many would be surprised to find that the answer is probably not. Feminist Scientists who have conducted research and reviewed scientific literature have come to understand what many of us have known all along; that there is no proof to suggest that by virtue of being "male" or "female" one will express any specific traits. They confirm what feminists, sociologists and everyday people have always intuitively understood: That it is not any biological proclivity specific to those born what is known to be male that makes men aggressive and unemotive, but instead the culture of socialization that men experience. In other words, it is what males are taught.

And what are men taught? From birth, the socialization process based on “gender” begins. In most major hospitals, after birth children perceived to be young girls are given pink blankets, and those perceived to be young boys are given the color blue. The colors are not problematic, they are emblematic. They represent the very different messages, beliefs and ideas young boys and girls will receive about who they are , who they should be, and what it is not acceptable to be. This education will come through many forms, it will come through the family, in the form of relatives, cousins, uncles and aunts. It will come through television, music, and books. Boys will be given toy trucks, young girls dolls. If the boys desire dolls, that behavior will be shunned. The boys will be moved towards things that incite aggression. Toys that prep them for war. A quick glance at the “boys” section of any department store will reveal this. All of the toys young boys are encouraged to play with are toys that pertain to fighting, to power, and to control. This is apart of the socialization process. This trait of aggression is encouraged it is not innate.

This socialization process will continue throughout their lives, and will be unespcapable. At every turn young men will hear: real men don’t take no shit. Real men get lots of pussy. Real men have it under control, have their lives under control, have “their women” under control.
In even families who choose not to adhere to this strict manhood code, there children will nonetheless, as long as they participate in western society, be affected by it. The ideology of “maleness” will loom over them all of their lives.
But what is the cost to us as individuals, whether “male” or “female” who embrace this ideology? As an instructor at Men Stopping Violence, A social change organization dedicated to ending male violence against women, I got to see first hand what the cost of this manhood code is to men. Every day I work with men of different ages, different races, different nationalities and though they all were affected and responded to the dominant concept of masculininty differently, they are Men who, from birth internalized that to be a real man they had to “suck it up.” “It” being their emotions and their feelings. But What happens to a human being who is encouraged, through ideology and indoctrination, to disconnect from and not express their emotions and feelings because they make them “less than? What happens to a human being instructed all its life to never express hurt or pain, sadness and sorrow, because it will make them “less than?” What happens when rage and anger are the only ok feeling?
Well. It seems we can look to our world to find the answer, whether “male” or female” the absorption of a power over ethic has left us all in a less than desirable situation. It has left us with a world culture that values dominance and hierarchy, inequality and condemnation, and that is oppossed to any ethic that declares us each as divine, worthy of love, and worthy of life. It leaves us with dangerous masculinity. And at the end of the day, it’s the masculinity, our at least our definition of it, that is killing us all.